Merkel to Campaign for Sarkozy?

Image via Wikipedia

Does anybody else think that this is going to end badly?  I am sure that the French will be celebrating in the streets that the Germans are giving them voting advice. 

The odds are that Sarkozy is going to lose despite the additional 500,000 Armenian diaspora votes he's secured by limiting freedom of speech (not to mention, thought).  Has Germany considered the consequential reaction of the winners?

European Coalition Cracking?

Europe is showing the cracks over the UNSC no-fly zone implementation as the US withdraws from its “leadership” position. Despite the hysterical, and in the case of Dennis Kucinich in the US, downright stupid, comments from US critics of the UNSC mission, the US has performed its stated policy perfectly and will vanish from the news as it has fired its last cruise missile. Now comes the interesting part in Europe.

France wants to continue to lead the charge in Libya and really is aiming to remove Qaddafi, one way or another. It does not want NATO involved as the operational structure of NATO would restrict French military activities – which are bent on regime change. Although a NATO lead would provide significant organizational assets, it would be a political mistake as that would make this purely a Western intervention despite the Security Council resolution. Italy wants NATO because it knows this will slow the regime change meme and result in a stalemate so it could continue to deal with Qaddafi. No one has asked how Qatari or other Arab forces would operate under NATO, whether wise or not, or if they would even agree to that arrangement.

So the maneuvering begins. Germany, as ever, is showing its inability to take part in anything with a combat role – making it more useless to NATO than ever except for base facilities. The German government will be suitably shocked at Qaddafi’s staged atrocities (something al Jazeera has already revealed as fake but credulity - deliberate or not - in some quarters rules). Like Italy, but for different reasons, it would support the lead role for NATO - if for nothing else than putting the brakes on France. As yet, it is unclear what positions Norway, Canada and the Arab League have on who should control the campaign, although in the case of the latter, getting rid of Qaddafi is high on the “to do” list.

Although I think that delivering the command and control to NATO is a bad idea on any number of levels, the decision of who will run the continuing campaign will be decided in a week or so – hopefully giving the French additional time to complete their agenda. If they are unable to take out the regime, and with the Libyan armor and artillery pretty much decimated, the regime will likely revert to an insurgency campaign involving urban terror campaigns and exhibits, when possible, of Western atrocities suitably staged with moveable military bodies dressed as civilians. This would mean a long haul campaign for which many (but not all) Europeans have never had any stomach and which will require a different approach.

Fortunately, very, very soon, the US will be out of the picture. Then little, if anything will be covered in the US because limited activities of logistical support to its allies is not exciting or controversial – unless critics on the left and right feel that support to US allies is not in its foreign policy interests. President Obama’s policy will have worked and other events will receive more play. Faux News can then go back to covering those nasty union people and any other pet anti-democratic project Murdoch and the Koch brothers have on their minds while CNN (in the US, not Europe or Asia) will simply get bored and go back to its normal useless news coverage of the latest flower shows. I suggest that people start viewing al Jazeera for continuing coverage if they so desire.

Russia's Roosting Chickens

Image via Wikipedia

Much to my surprise, Brussels (but more likely Berlin) has been working tirelessly and quietly to remove the burden of Russian control over Europe’s (but actually Germany’s) severe dependence on gas from Siberia.

The European Union and Azerbaijan signed a deal Thursday in which Baku commits to supply Europe with "substantial volumes of gas," an agreement the EU said was an important step to reduce the bloc's dependence on deliveries from Russia.

Russia has used its energy resources as a weapon – not necessarily directly against Europe, but targeting Ukraine and Belarus. The strategy is aimed, and has largely succeeded, in assisting Moscow’s initial key foreign policy goals of regaining control of Ukraine and maintaining a thumb on Minsk. In doing so, however, Moscow alarmed Europe which needed to reduce gas imports from Russia before Russia began to use that same leverage to pressure the EU into ever more pro-Russian positions. The Kremlin’s energy gambit would allow it to loosen the support given by the EU to the Baltics, Poland and reduce other EU initiatives in the Caucuses and Central Asia. France, but not Germany, is immune to Russian pressure because of its huge nuclear energy facilities (a technology in which it is now the world leader).

The Russian move to bring Ukraine and the Caucuses back under its control was a key foreign policy goal of the Kremlin. The Russian Federation is a shell without Ukraine and the Caucuses is a buffer zone, like Belarus. The methods, however, were Putin’s. Without compunction, Putin’s Russia blatantly interfered in Ukrainian elections, invaded Georgia, signed virtually permanent military agreements with Armenia (outflanking Georgia and the West) and used disputes over gas pricing and transit fees with Ukraine to cut off gas supplies which happened to flow west. Europe, much to my surprise I admit, got the point and has started taking some action.

The faux democracy, single media environment of Russia built by Putin is now seeing some of its egg layers home to roost and one of them is named Nabucco.

Merkel, Barroso, Euro – Oh My

Image by European Parliament via Flickr

Now it’s personal. Last week, as reported in the Guardian, German suggestions to reform the Euro-zone and re-open the Lisbon Treaty elicited a sharply worded response from José Manuel Barroso, the current head of the EC. Calling the German Chancellor “naïve” for suggesting that the Lisbon Treaty be re-opened was not designed to raise the level of the debate or improve her mood. The German response - that Barroso’s remarks were “absurd” - put the discussion in the basement.
Outside of Germany, I don’t think that many in the Euro-zone or the EU in general would support the German proposals for several reasons. First, re-opening the Treaty, which barely won approval in the first place, for the sole purpose of inserting provisions to penalize member states for not following monetary policy, is far more absurd than Barroso’s opposition to the proposal. As Barroso’s pointedly reminded Merkel, the Euro was the brainchild of France and Germany. Both, incidentally, also breached the monetary policies that were established. For Germany now to push forward some sort of punishment mechanism strikes me as a species of economic and political hegemony that is particularly distasteful to most of the other member states. Furthermore, expelling a member for non-compliance would likely result in a permanent, volutary withdrawal for the targeted country. A similar result would likely occur if voting rights were withdrawn. The European idea would be dead.
Second, and related to the first, is that Merkel is making a blatant attempt to control and mold the EU in Germany's image. In other words, nationalism is driving the German proposals. Again. Merkel is treading on dangerous ground and she has only herself to blame. It is abundantly clear that her anti-Greek rhetoric not only inflamed German public opinion but also significantly delayed EU action to develop a rescue plan for Greece. German political actions were directed at assigning blame first rather than fixing the problem and designed to increase German control of the EU. This is what the original economic union was designed to avoid - the nationalism that brought Europe to its knees. Eastern and Southern Europe will not swallow that particular pill. The UK would have the perfectly justified reason for never considering closer ties with an EU run from Berlin.

Merkel has now lost her ruling coalition in parliament. She has managed to inflame German public opinion not only against Greece, but Greeks, implying an inferiority of all southern tier member states. They have done it to the Turks. Now the Greeks, and by implication, Spain and Portugal. That is a dangerous road for Germans to follow under any circumstance and German perseverance in that regard will drive the southern tier and the Eastern European members to look elsewhere for political and economic support out of their self-inflicted economic trap.